Bootstrapping from London to $10 Million: Alexandre Wentzo, CEO of Casewise (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: When you arrived, was the product already in place? Were they already selling?

Alexandre Wentzo: Yes. The product was only in English at that time. There was a need to put in place a sales team in Europe. We trained them on the product. We were a very small company. I had to translate the product and training guides. We started to work with a major business school in France to get some students from Marketing, mainly to help us improve the perception of the business. The culture difference between France and England is quite massive. One of the main competitors was a 300-people organization based in Paris.

Sramana Mitra: How did you navigate the market and sell the product in the beginning?

Alexandre Wentzo: Through networking. I know the government market. But I said, “Let’s try to focus on the retail market because we know that for them to survive, efficiency is key.” I started to work with a massive group called PPR. They own big brands like Yves Saint Laurent. I went through all the brands. We did Puma in Germany and Gucci in Italy. We got a massive footprint. That was how we started in the first couple of years.

Then we started to address the government market. In France, we started with the Ministry of Agriculture. Two years after that, we owned 85% of the government deals in France. The biggest break for us, at least in French market, is getting the Ministry of Education. From that success, we got the Department of Defense. Then we signed the agreement with the Ministry of Defense in England and then in US. Now, we have deals with 10 government bodies in the US, ranging from the Air Force to the White House.

Our focus initially was getting references that could speak louder than branding. We’re working hard on marketing and PR. Our main competitors today are bigger organizations like IBM. People come to us because we make the difference. I still believe people buy from people. We’ve got a well-trained and experience team of sales people. These are high-caliber people.

This segment is part 3 in the series : Bootstrapping from London to $10 Million: Alexandre Wentzo, CEO of Casewise
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